Dusken Glade Timeline

1491 DR (Year of the Scarlet Witch)

Tarsakh 14th

Session One: March 8th, 2019

It is the month of Tarsakh, called by the sages "the Claw of Storms." And so far, Waterdeep has done its part to make sure the month has lived up to its name. The tenday-long festival of Waukeentide, held at the beginning of Tarsakh, was celebrated first in the clutches of the last blizzard of the year, and then through a driving rainstorm that turned all the snow to slush for a few days before melting it away. Though it hasn't quite been warm enough yet to drive away all of the winter goddess Auril's presence, winter's sole fingerhold is in patches of filthy ice, tucked away under porches and in alleys that never see the wan spring sunlight.

The past few days have been rainy and gusty, chill winds driving tiny, icy needles of rain into anyone who is out in the middle of it. But today is the first day it is somewhat warm. Of course, in true Waterdhavian fashion, that means that the streets of the city are, even so close to highsun, a murky labyrinth of fog-shrouded cobbles. Folk pass by one another, rising up out of the mists like wraiths, only to vanish again as they continue on their way.

In the Palace of the Open Lord, the highest tower rings, the great Gondish clockwork timekeeper known as Timehands tolling out the hour of the day. Ten times he tolls, for ten bells in the morning. Where is your character this time of day?

• 14th: Each member of the cell is tending to their daily lives: Orion at a late breakfast with his family, celebrating a successful release of his mother's new perfume "Glow"; Heinrich helping his Aunt Mayphelia remove the winter storm shutters from her small Trades Ward house, she worried about his injuries from the Griffins Gather fight he lost the night before; Psalm waking late abed with Tharmuth Majarra, and gossiping worriedly about the new boy Roalon has fallen for; Sylyra sitting down for tea with Zirisstra, who gifts her with a lovely gray-green cloak with silver stitching, for when she goes into the Ardeep; Clarc sitting down for elsun tea with his mother Denabria, who asks him about his training with Master Dumak; and Frick wakened by Mishaelle, who begs him to help her offload a delivery to the house, excited over the prospect of working with some of the famous silverclay that comes out of the River Rauvin near Silverymoon.
  • The PCs are summoned by Denabria to the Dusken Glade. She tells them that she needs them to go to the Cliffwatch Inn to pick up a package from a Harper agent named Fendus Bern.
  • The agents arrive at the inn, and wait around for a bit, mingling with the locals, but he never shows.
  • They return to the Dusken Glade, and Denabria sends them to investigate his last known location: Undercliff Village.
  • They get down to the village, and find it has no inn. At its sole tavern, the Cracked Cask, they find that not only was Fendus there last night, but he also told the tavernkeep, Reya Athren that he was a Harper.
  • She is apparently in need of some help: her sister, Fiirna, is an apprentice to the wizard Martuin in the tower just north of the Amendsfarm. She hasn't heard from her in days, and when she went to check, she found the doors sealed and no one answered her hails.
  • Reya also tells them that Fendus was offered a place to sleep in the cratehouse of the Milmyvyn orchard, just down the road.
  • The group decides to head down the road to the orchard while Clarc flies out to the tower to see what is going on with the wizard and his apprentice.

Session Two: March 15th, 2019

Previously, the Dusken Glade Harpers were given a mission: to find the Harper courier named Fendus Bern, who was reportedly arriving in Waterdeep bearing a magical gem for Denabria, who was charged with passing it on to her superiors. But when he failed to show up at the Cliffwatch Inn, she sent her agents down into the Undercliff to try and find him.

While there, they encountered Reya, a young tavernkeep at the Cracked Cask, in Undercliff Village, who told them that he'd taken space for the night at the Milmyvyn Orchard. But she also asked them, as Harpers, to please investigate another problem: her sister, apprentice to the wizard Martuin, hasn't been heard from in almost a tenday. She is worried for her sister, and desperate for help, but no one will go up to bother the cantankerous old wizard.

It is mid-afternoon when the group departs from the Cracked Cask, most of them bound for the Milmyvyn Orchard, but Clarc winging northward to take a look around Martuin's tower.

• 14th (con't): Clarc flew to Martuin's Tower, and looked around some. He sees a raven, which startles and flies off. Landing on the crennelated roof of the gatehouse, he tries to descend a set of stairs, but triggers a glyph of warding that explodes in thunderous sound, knocking him back and badly injuring him.
  • The others arrive at the orchard and meet the family. The father, Vogundun Milmyvyn, tells them that he met Fendus and invited him to stay in the family's cratehouse. Fendus accepted, and they settled him in for the night after a dinner. When they got up the next morning, he was gone, the bed made, and a gold coin on the pillow.
  • Their thirteen-year-old, Vaelee seems to have something more to say but doesn't want to do so around her father. As Vogundun takes most of them to see the cratehouse, Sylyra stays behind to chat with her, offering her one of her woodcarvings to get her talking. She tells Sylyra:
    • She went to outhouse after bed, and was on her way back to the house when she heard him playing his harp. So she hid nearby to listen to him.
    • Some men came sneaking out of the orchard, and she hid in the kitchen. She watched them attack him, and they left with him, dragging him through the orchard.
  • While the group is investigating the cratehouse looking for any clues, Orion spots a tiny beholder, which attacks him. Heinrich rounds the corner, surprising the wee beholder, and puts a quarrel through its central eye; it disappears.
  • Vogundun shouts a warning as six men begin to attack them with crossbows from hiding in the orchard.
  • The fight continues until some man in robes bursts through the door of the house (having gotten in while invisible and the Harpers were distracted with battle), holding Vogundun's wife Benyth hostage, threatening to kill her if they did not throw down their arms.
    • Heinrich sneaks through the house, while an invisible Sylyra sneaks closer to the porch where he stands.
    • Heinrich attacks him from stealth, bulls-rushing him and knocking him off the porch, freeing Benyth, and Sylyra steps between the villain and the downed goodwife.
  • The group attacks the wizard and he nearly kills Heinrich with a phantasmal killer spell, and then magic missiles. He is difficult to hit due to a displacement illusion, but Sylyra strips it from him with a magic missile of her own. Orion – in the form of a bear – attacks and downs him shortly thereafter.
  • The last of the crossbowmen surrenders, and the Harpers elect to take them prisoner to ask questions.
  • Meanwhile Sylyra begins to drag bodies off to burn them in the field outside the orchard(!)

Session Three: March 22nd, 2019

Previously, the Dusken Glade Harpers were given a mission: to find the Harper courier named Fendus Bern, who was reportedly arriving in Waterdeep bearing a magical gem for Denabria, who was charged with passing it on to her superiors. But when he failed to show up at the Cliffwatch Inn, she sent her agents down into the Undercliff to try and find him.

Your investigation has taken you to the Undercliff, where Fendus was last seen. Reya, the tavernkeep at the Cracked Cask in Undercliff Village not only directed you to the Milmyvyn Orchard where he spent the night, but also asked you to investigate her missing sister, an apprentice at a wizard's tower, which Clarc investigated and found quite tightly sealed up.

At the orchard, you found the family there wary but willing to help, with one of their daughters describing to Sylyra and Clarc how he was attacked and taken in the night by strange men. As the others investigated the cratehouse where he disappeared from, however, they were attacked by six crossbowmen and a wizard. After a tense hostage situation involving the wife of the farmstead, you defeated the attackers, taking the badly hurt wizard and one of the crossbowmen prisoner to interrogate.

It is getting late into the afternoon when the group sits down to ask some pointed questions of their prisoners. Only Sylyra is missing, having hauled away the bodies of the attackers to burn in a field nearby…

• 14th (con't): Sylyra (with Frick nearby) is preparing to immolate the corpses of the crossbowmen who attacked the Milmyvyn Orchard, in accordance with the dictates of her faith, when a troop of the Guard shows up, having been fetched by Maele Milmyvyn. After one soldier mistakes her for an "ogre mage", Armar Budold Flulviir (the lieutenant in charge) explains that she can't simply burn corpses wherever she pleases, no matter her religion. Sylyra cedes them the corpses, and she and Frick accompany them back to the orchardhouse.
  • In the meantime, Heinrich, Psalm, Orion, and Clarc conduct an interrogation of the wizard Ert Tilleth and the last crossbowman Alkus Vanhurn. With the wizard gagged, but his thoughts secretly monitored by Psalm via detect thoughts spell, they primarily interrogate the crossbowman, who tells him that he was a bandit whose captain was recruited by Banite priests. They pick up a number of bits of info through conversation and psychic eavesdropping, including the name of the Banite's leader (Dreadmaster Maeskyr Zelmaskos), the fact that they were after the stone (which is called the Tyrantstone), and the fact that the group is based out of some place called "Highsteed House." They also learn that another group of Banites are out at an old house at the base of the cliffs, waiting for them to return. Vogundun identifies the house as the Old Lalstyn House, which hasn't been lived in for thirty or forty years.
  • Shortly after Sylyra and Frick arrive with the Guard, another shows up: the smol goat who introduces herself in perfect Common as Nibbles. She commends Frick for not mutilating the wizard just to keep him from casting spells, and then suggests they strap him into some armor to keep him from casting spells. Vogundun happily volunteers his father's old suit of studded leather for the purpose, and the Guard takes away the two Banites while the Milmyvyn family packs up to go stay with some friendly neighbors until this is all tended to.
  • The Harpers find the Tyrantstone tucked between the inner and outer walls of the structure, up near the rafters, securing it. They then decide to head out to the Old Lalstyn House to rescue Fendus Bern.
• xxx

Tarsakh 15

Session Four: March 29th, 2019

The Dusken Glade Cell returned to Waterdeep with the remains of poor Fendus Bern, Harper courier murdered by fanatics of Bane. They also return with the Tyrantstone, having successfully kept it out of the hands of those fanatic.

After a quick night's rest, the Cell regroups at the Dusken Glade with the intention of seeking out the strange silence at Martuin's Tower, in the Undercliffs below Waterdeep. Clarc's initial (and somewhat painful) exploration has revealed that the tower is defended by glyphs of warding, and possibly other magical protections.

• 14th (con't): xxx